It is authoritatively learned that if jhe approval of the Secretary of State Is received during the current month, reductions in the postal rates from Hongkong to Great Britain will be brought into effect as from July 1.
Under the revised rates, it Is understood that the contemplated charge for correspondence to. the United Kingdom and other parts of the Empire will be ten cents per ounce, as Against twelve cents at present, with corresponding reductions for additional weight.
Musleat Soctety Season Photographer's: Trials Not daunted by the past tempestufous season. the Hongkong Philhar moule Society has decided to produce the concert version of "Merrie England" next. November. It will be under the direction of Mr. J, Ander~ son Miller, trast, according to the hon. secretary, Mr. R. A. Bates. The venue for the presentation of "Merrie England" has not yet been decided upon, but untrammelied by the exigencies of stage-craft, the concert fay be given on either side of the harbour. "One of the pitfalls encountered by the society when it produced "The Pirates of Penzance"
wt season was the need for pro viding an elaborate setting—in a theatre which Involved a heavy out~ Jay for rental.
During the recent meeting of the:
ity, Prof. W. Brown, the newly otod president, dealt at length with the troubles of the past and the pros pects for the future. He laid particular emphasis on the apparent hopelessness of making any production pay its way until a new City Hall provided local amateurs with a theatre, suitable in size and in equipment, and obtainable at a cost which would not involve a deficit.
Mr, Anderson Miller is bringing to his task of musical leadership. abundant knowledge and extensive experience of choral work, which it is anticipated will do much toward fusing new Rife and enthusiasm into, the organization. Already a feeling optimism for the new season is Dervading the membership of the Philharmonte, which remembers that professionals are having their trout Jes in these days, trying in the extreme to all exponents of the arts.
'Teachers' Day Meeting Hongkong had its frst local observance of Teachers' Day last Wednes-@ay, celebrating with appropriate ex-reises a day which was Orst set part In China some three years ago.
'And though "every day is Teachers' Day during the summer, when half sessions are the rule here," as some one pointed out there was a special meeting at the King's Theatre, when Sir William Hornell addressed the. assembled educators The importance of the study of Chinese and the necessity of aequiring lucidity of expression in their own Language was pointed out in the of the address, as Sir Thomas ded his audience that they were dealing with living material and not When Paramount decided to secure 1 set of sound records from China to He in the studio's morgue, the firm little dreamed of the obstacles their camera man, Mr. B, Proulx, would encounter. Given permission to re~ ord all the sounds he wanted in Canton as well as in Kuangtung Province, the photographer went ahead with, his work, until the report: was circulate Jed that Canton authorities are de-ermined to press for the surrender' at the accompanying film. For it seems to be impossible to record sounds without making a picture to synchronize with them.
Mr, Proulx made this statement in "The whole report is an cation, nothing more than an effort to boycott Paramount and ring a bad name on the firm." The manager of the Hongkong office of Paramount Film Corporation Jhina, Me, flatly denied that any picture was taken, reiterating his atement that only sounds of street reises were recorded, along with the chanting of nuns, and that on a neative record, which they were returning to the Canton authorities The report had it that a film de-acting scenes of low class Chinese fe in the interior of Kuangtung pro-
/mons has. been Tt was their plan to fle the but they have offered to re-tim the record to the Canton auth-
Troops to Be Moved Under the provisional trooping programme for 1034-35, the Ist Bat-{alion South Wales Borderers, at tent stationed in Hongkong, will leave the Colony in H. M. Transport Somersetshire on November 29" for Karachi, and will proceed from that port to Rawalpindi They are being relieved in Hongkong by the 2nd Battalion Welch Fusiliers, who are at present Gibraltar, and who will arrive by the Somersetshire on her outward curney on November 22.
The Ist Battalion Royal Tnniskillug Fusiliers arrive in Shanghai from he United Kingdom on November 12] 'nH. M. 'T, Dorsetshire, and will relove the 2nd Battalion Worcestershire Regiment who are to be transferred to Tientsin. The Ist Battalion Queen's Regiment leave Chinwangtao for Quetta on November 24 and will pass through the Colony—on November 30.
Mr, 'T. ¥. Chan presided over the meeting which attracted many prominent' educationalists, among them Sir Shew-son Chow.
During his talk, Sir William Hornell stressed the importance of sending out into the world from the schools of Hongkong boys and girls who had no such handicap as lack of knowledge of their own 1 "This fs your problem an exaggeration to say that it Is a problem on which the future of the Chinese community of Hongkong largely Sepends," he declared.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.